PROVIDENCE – The original idea of the Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy was to create a pedestrian-friendly environment, promote arts and culture and bolster economic well-being through the city’s various downtown greenspaces. However, that concept has been fully on pause for close to three years.
But the idea of creating a network to bring various programming to city parks has not been paused. Now, there’s hope that a new independent nonprofit organization can get the public engaged in activities around these greenspaces.
Jessica David, who serves as a consultant for the Providence Foundation, told Providence Business News Thursday that local parks advocates are looking to launch a new 501c3 nonprofit by the end of the year, bring to life the original vision that the Downtown Providence Parks Conservancy was supposed to be.
David said the Providence Foundation – of which the parks conservancy was originally associated with – and the city convened a 16-person steering committee to discuss the concept of a downtown parks network. The group spent the past year looking over what the network’s vision would be and how to best activate the eight to 10 public spaces that exist in downtown, David said.
“This group is really working on making those world-class parks like they should be and have a cohesive presence,” David said. “It feels connected to the uniqueness of Providence to the history and cultures of Providence.”
David said the group would like to see Waterplace Park, Burnside Park, Memorial Park and the large greenspace on the former Interstate 195 land. She said the network would not “in any way” take over the spaces or maintain them since many of the parks are already owned in some capacity. However, the network’s priority would be more about supplementing that and helping the owners to have more resources.
David said the group is still determining what kind of resources the network would offer to support the parks. But, she said the network would offer some programming similar to a pilot program that was run last summer.
“We did things like music, children’s programming, a jump circle, things like that and throughout the spaces,” David said.
The network would have a business structure, such as having an executive director, a governing board and a “community advisory” board, a programming director, an operating budget and a long-term fundraising plan. Fundraising, right now, is the group’s primary area of focus, David said.
David said the group is actively raising money now, seeking funds from corporate donors and private philanthropists, to help the nonprofit get off the ground. The group, she said, is also putting together corporate sponsorship packages for the programming that the network is planning for the spring and summer. David also said the network, long term, hopes to put together an endowment or a trust that will exist in perpetuity for these spaces.
“We need to get that right because if we don’t get that right, this is not going to last. This is about a long-term partnership to take care of these spaces,” she said.
David also hopes that the network can seek community input regarding what residents, both within the city and outside, would like to see done within the parks and equally have a voice in the process.
“[We need] someone who looks at something that the board is not seeing and what needs to be addressed and what they would love to see happen there,” David said.
James Bessette is the PBN special projects editor, and also covers the nonprofit and education sectors. You may reach him at Bessette@PBN.com. You may also follow him on Twitter at @James_Bessette.
